


with scarce my reason, with my fingers

by Blue_moon_girl14



Category: Greek and Roman Mythology
Genre: F/M, Fluff and Angst, Foreshadowing, Friendship, Gen, Omens & Portents, i just really like Pablo Neruda, more like relationship foreshadowing, no real pairing action here, of neruda poems, unabashed use
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-08
Updated: 2016-04-08
Packaged: 2018-05-31 23:45:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6492553
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blue_moon_girl14/pseuds/Blue_moon_girl14
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>An interlude before a turning event.</p>
<p>“The usual. Chance and fate are just the same. Confusing as fuck and bitchy.” His voice snapped at the last word. If the blaspheme carried any weight, the temple of the Fates remained a stoic, damp outcrop. The boy sniffed. “You?”</p>
<p>Crushed pomegranates flashed in her thoughts.</p>
            </blockquote>





	with scarce my reason, with my fingers

**Author's Note:**

> I liked the idea of a friendship between cousins and I'm alway game to write friendship and family vignettes. As for the title, I just really like Neruda, and the poem "Entrance Into Wood" is v nice.
> 
> This is an interlude before the canon myth.

When Kore came back from being hurried out of a meeting with the Three Fates, she was met with the sight of a dejected looking Dionysus, his elbows supporting his reclining body on the gleaming stone steps of the temple. His golden crowned hair provided a striking contrast to the blackness of the place, and she was strongly reminded of flax and wheat fields ripe for threshing. The urge to run her fingers through the curls the same way she did with the wheat grain was stifled, hidden in a compartment at a safe distance from her impulsive mind. 

She gathered the folds of her clothes and sat beside him. Dionysus may not have been looking at her, but Kore knew that he was aware of her presence. 

“Little cousin.” Dionysus drawled, his aquiline nose turned to the pinprick of light leading outside. He seemed to be in a terrible mood, the kind that determined whether one was going to raze the world to the ground or not. 

Kore coughed. Twice. Thrice. “What happened?” 

“The usual. Chance and fate are just the same. Confusing as fuck and bitchy.” His voice snapped at the last word. If the blaspheme carried any weight, the temple of the Fates remained a stoic, damp outcrop. The boy sniffed. “You?”

Crushed pomegranates flashed in her thoughts. 

“A bad omen.” She shrugged, trying to emulate his cool apathy and failing. “That’s why my mom’s taking a while.”

Dionysus laughed. “Trying to argue with the Fates is like trying to dry the oceans. But Lady Demeter’s got balls of steel.” Stretching his arms forward, he sighed deeply. His fingers twitched slightly, a direct correlation to the state of his nerves. “Bad omens could mean anything. It could be unfortunate for one side or both. Bad omens could mean dropping a bowl on your foot the following day, or an average harvest, or the next civil war.”

She recognized his prickly efforts of attempting to comfort her, and warmth bloomed in Kore’s chest. He never made the effort to be nice to the other important gods, save her mother. “What made you come here?” 

Dionysus looked pained. “I turned some pirates into dolphins.” 

She gazed upon him with a mixture of awe and laughter. “What on earth-“ 

He looked embarrassed. “They were nice enough. I didn’t feel entirely guilty until I woke up last night dreaming-“ he caught himself. “Anyway, it’s not relevant.”

“Dreaming of what?” Kore persisted. 

Studying the simple hem design of his tunic, Dionysus shrugged. “I dreamt of the ocean. A girl by the shore. Footprints on the sand.”

She thought about it for a moment. “That doesn’t seem bad. Like nostalgia.”

“And you?” His stunning violet eyes fixed on her. Kore thought he looked like a handsomer, dark haired version of Apollo. Much less flamboyant, and one who wouldn’t dive for cover at the first hint of Demeter. “What omens plague the little miss?”

“I’m not little!” 

“Grow up to be my height and we’ll start talking. Until then, no sass from you, midget.”

Kore pouted, then adopted the same nonchalant shrug her cousin affected a while ago. She spoke steadily. “I dreamt of a tree growing in a dark cave. It was a pomegranate tree, and surrounding it were crushed pomegranate fruits.” The juices seeped out like spilt blood. There was a white flower growing underneath the shadow of the tree, and red was staining its corners. 

Dionysus’ brow furrowed. “Makes no sense.” He remarked aloud. To him, pomegranates had a binding connotation that he couldn’t connect to a little girl. Then, some part of him observed how unease had roiled in her stomach and coiled itself tensely in her body, he added: “As do all things the Fates perceive and send us.” 

Somehow the wine deity always seemed comforting, despite his apathetic and cynical background. Kore let out a small, breathless laugh. “Thanks, Dionysus.”

From behind them a large metal-rusted door groaned shut. Dionysus met her eyes and cocked his head. “Want me to ask your mother if we could visit a human settlement a few miles from here? There’s a growing vineyard we can check out. The owner imported some new vines.”

Kore felt like her smile and good cheer was going to split her face like a watermelon. “Gods, yes please.” She scrambled to her sandaled feet trying to meet her cousin’s long legged gait to meet the harvest goddess. It was best not to overthink things. She bumped her shoulder against Dionysus’ side and was immensely pleased when he let her without complaint. 

A handful of seeds. Could have laughed over it, at the thought of ruination coming from a handful of seeds. The sun still shone with the fierceness of another day. When she stepped out of the darkness, she let her smile unrestrained even as Dionysus argued compromises and safety procedures with her amused mother for a harmless day out. 

I want to clutch these days close to me, Kore thought. I want to keep them to me and savor them like nibbling a fresh peach. No matter what the fates say, these days, these fleeting bursts of happiness are mine. 

 

(Deep beneath the earth and the shadows, the king of the underworld smiled and waited.)


End file.
